the u.s. to give france carry out strikes against the syrian government in response to an alleged chemical attack in eastern guta the intervention came just hours before international inspectors would do to arrive to investigate the claims. the united nations security council will this hour can be to discuss the attack which russia says was a clear violation of the organizations charter. u.k. prime minister lourdes the joint military operation against assad's government was

limited targeted and effective. and in other news russia's foreign minister claims the international chemical weapons watchdog may not have correctly identified the nerve agent used poison script. last month. saturday six pm here in moscow namecalling brail rolling coverage of the aftermath of those joint strikes against syria overnight we're expecting the united nations security council to convene any moment and when we hear from the keeper tagon is there we will cross live to it but let's bring you up to date on what we know so far american british and french forces have pounded syria with missile strikes the attack took place in the early hours of saturday morning and came in response to allegations that the syrian government used chemical weapons against civilians claims which are u.n. watchdog is still yet to investigate. well

as i said the u.n. security council to expected to start that emergency session anytime now is how the request of russia moscow's called the strikes of violation of the un charter i got more on the reaction from moscow from correspondent igor down of well president putin has condemned in the strongest words as to what happened these strikes conducted by the u.s. the u.k. and france he said that they targeted not just to the military facilities but also civilian infrastructure as well as saying that this goes against in violation of all international norms and in fact it wasn't sanctioned by the u.n.

security council has also said that it's pretext for the strikes the u.s. and its allies used a fake used a stage to chemical attack he said that in a statement he said that he did not believe that the chemical attack took place that in fact the russian military that entered the city of doom of the site of the chemical incident could not find any traces of the of any toxic agents or anything of the sort not even any eyewitnesses of the attack could be found apparently so here's what how vladimir putin described the situation right now the organization for the prohibition of chemical weapons has deployed its specialist on a fact finding mission. but a group of western countries cynically ignored this launching a military attack without waiting for the results of the investigation russia emphatically condemns this attack on syria well russian servicemen are helping the

legitimate government fight terrorists with its actions the united states only exacerbates the humanitarian disaster in syria bringing suffering to civilians essentially abetting terrorists who have been tormenting the syrian people for seven years and provoking a new wave of refugees from this country and the region in general mr putin mention the o.p.c. w. investigation there any concerns the that might be in jeopardy now yes of course because the o.p.c. w was supposed to begin its mission in syria on the ground in syria its investigation on saturday at the u.s. launched its strikes literally hours before with that investigation was supposed to kick off so obviously a lot of questions were raised by whether or not that mission is jeopardized whether or not any objects of infrastructure that were supposed to be examined by the experts over the o.p.c. w. were hit or damaged now the body has issued a statement it's

a rather brief one literally just two sentences outlining the current state of events and they are saying that they will be going forward with their mission in syria no details as to whether or not they feel affected in any way by the strikes back to the reaction from moscow then anything more wider than the kremlin well yes the russia's foreign ministry has laid out its view of the situation right now they've said that basically the u.n. security council has to hold accountable the u.s. the u.k. and france for what they did in syria they promised to present its russia's facts what russia knows about the strikes to the u.n. security council and in fact they've said that. the russians calling emergency meeting of the council as early as later today they've also addressed something that france had to say while justifying its produce a patient in the strikes france had said that basically it had intelligence

information that since two thousand and thirteen the syrian government were pursuing the secret chemical weapons program despite the your p c w n twenty sixteen vouching that the stockpile had been destroyed something in a process overseen by russia and the un as well as a however the spokeswoman for the russian foreign ministry she said that basically if france knew that all along four years why hold back the information why come forward with it only now so many years later for donald trump in his first tweet after the attack he thanked u.s. allies and said the results couldn't have been better he called the strikes perfectly executed despite syrian and russian military saying that most of the missiles have been intercepted by defense systems. well these are the three sites the washington claims that it targeted in syria which it believes were capable of producing chemical weapons among them is a research facility located between the capital damascus and the city of dubai

where the alleged chemical incident is said to have taken place to show you some video now this is from a video agency purportedly showing the aftermath of the strike on one of those research facilities of the syrian government says it was nothing more than a civilian scientific center. morgan has more on how the attack unfolded. but we heard an announcement from u.s. president donald trump about the pending strike against the syrian government in coordination with the u.k. and france he used some rather inflammatory language it's kind of almost trademark language of us present very terrible regime these are not the actions of a man. they are crimes of a monster instead so today the nations of britain france and the united states of america have marshaled their righteous power against barbarism and brutality

now after that we got a military update our we heard from general joseph dunford as well as u.s. secretary of defense james mattis it's important to note that when james mattis was speaking not only after the attacks but also earlier in the week he wasn't willing to go into detail about the attack and was rather vague about the kind of information that he actually had but i am confident the syrian regime conducted a chemical attack on innocent people. we are very confident that chlorine was used we are not ruling out sharon right now we have the intelligence level of competence that we needed to conduct the attack. i believe there was a chemical attack and we're looking for the actual evidence the o.p.c. w this you're going to station for the chemical weapons convention and we're trying to get those inspectors in if we get them and we will not know who did it they can

only say that they found evidence or did not broader in the international community there is simply not consensus about what actually happened in the syrian town of duma we've seen the u.n. security council meetings and we've seen a big disagreement between countries russia's representative has come forward before the u.n. security council and said that they have sent russian experts and russia chemical experts to do and in duma they have not found any traces of chemicals they have not found any victims who have come forward and said they witnessed or that they themselves are victims of chemical attacks no one in hospitals being treated and we then heard nikki haley the representative of the united states before the u.n. security council did a chemical weapons attack happened. yes the u.s. has analyzed he yes it has happened the u.k. has analyzed yes it has happened france has analyzed yes it is that three separate analysis all coming back with the same thing there is proof that this happened

people were anticipating this strike because of donald trump's tweet saying telling russia to get ready for the missiles you know insulting the syrian president was certain language are waiting to see what the next move is and what will happen next in the international community meanwhile people in to of syria's largest cities damascus and aleppo have rallied together against the u.s. led military action you can see flags there being waved in support of the syrian government and i did some russian flags as well here's what some of the residents in the capital had to say. the strike to does not break you shall make you stronger we are standing steadfast to syrian people feel of will in our staff that. we condemn and denounce this assault on our country we say long leave assad the lion of assad will not be shaken not that said these people who were steadfast for seven years and north here a strike from an ignorant bly of drama filled with on the the white house says it's

confident the syrian government did use chemical weapons against its own people believe however appears to be based largely on media and n.-g. o. reports this conclusion is based on descriptions of the attack in multiple media sources the reported symptoms experienced by victims videos and images showing to assess to barrel bombs from the attack and reliable information indicating coordination between syrian military officials before the attack. some of the groups that originally made the claim some would first circulated the images showing the aftermath of the supposed attack have g.b.s. reputations one of those is the civil defense group the white house mates and although it's been widely praised in the west for its rescue work it's members of repeatedly being accused of having links to extremist groups another source of the claims is the lesser known syrian american medical society or sams it's funded by usaid which works closely with the state department sams is banned in multiple countries and has been accused of interfering in domestic politics and promoting

regime change the russian defense ministry is analyze one of the videos purporting to show the aftermath of the alleged chemical attack in dubai and says it managed to identified some of the people who were filmed in it one claims to be a medical student who was working in the hospital that the victims were being brought to here's what he had to say about the incident. my name is. i am a medical student i work in the e.r. department of dumas central hospital on april eighth a building in the city was bombed the upper floors were destroyed and the bottom floors caught fire all the injured from that building were brought to our hospital the residents from the upper floors were suffering from smoke inhalation. and that is what we treated them for based on the symptoms they exhibited during treatment some person came in i don't know who that was and said that it was a chemical attack people got scared a fight broke out relatives of the victims started pouring water on one another

others began to give inhalers for asthma the children even though these people were not medical professionals we did not see any patients exhibiting symptoms of chemical poisoning a video in which the medic can be see was picked up by a number of news outlets and treated as evidence of a chemical attack on bridges a security analyst a former u.k. army officer joins us now hello there charles just to let you know we might have to interrupt our conversation in case we have to go live to the u.n. kind of talk about the strikes first of all the chemical the pentagon said that the facilities that were struck that no chemical leaks were so far occurring in the aftermath of that does that add up to you in what you know if you striking a facility that supposedly could make chemical weapons there must be risks attached to that. yes one of the thought i'm not a chemical x. the expert but i know a bit about explosives and certainly explosives would disperse any agent into the of course it depends really on what constitutes they are no such course it depends

where they're even there the fact that chemical weapons storage sites as they're alleged to be have been struck. but also have been struck with such advance notice because after all there is no surprise about this attack or about its targeting and of course especially about its timing which she can come back to and therefore of course have been chemical weapons. or the chemicals needed for them they could also have been moved along with the technicians and so i think from america's perspective let's say america we mean america britain and france this is a very symbolic strike it's a bigger strike than the one we saw last year but nonetheless it was telegraphed well in advance i've got no doubts as well that to avoid any possibility or probability at least of russians being killed or injured in this attack that the information about this attack was probably passed to russia there is a de confliction arrangement between the forces that are in syria it would have

been very prudent to pass that information on to russia and certainly one would imagine and i think america france and britain would imagine that that would then be passed on to syria and so really this is where people can say this is an effective strike i would have very doubt very great doubts from even from the western perspective this was effective in any way other than sending a message and that message is largely must be said i think in america too trumps to mess that audience particularly the media and in britain of course treason has very important local elections coming up in just a couple of weeks time because first of all of course if it's supposed to be a message to assad that presumes it is a big presumption that assad actually carried out this attack because of course we haven't had any investigation yet about the duma incident or even if it was a chemical instant as yet we don't know. and secondly of course there was the attack last year which again didn't stop these attacks taking place in the chemical instance elfin think one would argue late at night because i like i just it was

a false flag have to stop me that's why we do have to go to the u.n. thanks very much for joining us but now hopefully wouldn't catch up with you again a little bit later let's go live to new york the u.n. security council's in session let's go there live. made a special statement today and i will quote him to the on the fourteenth of april the united states supported by its ally it launched an airstrike against military and civilian targets of the syrian arab republic. thirty without a mandate from the united nations security council and in violations of un charter and norms and principles of international law and aggression against a sovereign state was carried out its of which is on the front line in the fight against terrorism. just as one year ago we go out and when about the shower air base in syria came under attack the united states used as a pretext to stage chemical attack against civilians that the most this time in

duma damascus suburb. the russian military experts did not find any trace of chlorine or any other toxic agent well that's. when they visited the site not a single local resident was able to confirm that a chemical attack had actually taken place is what was. the organization for the prohibition of chemical weapons dispatched its experts to syria in order to investigate all the circumstances of a misnomer however in a scientific cynical distain a group of western countries decided to take military action without waiting for the results of the investigation in russia condemns in the strongest possible terms the attack against syria where russian military personnel are assisting the legitimate government in its counterterrorism three year from society. through its actions the united states makes an already catastrophic humanitarian situation in syria even worse and bring suffering to civilians. in fact the u.s.

panders to the terrorists who have been tormenting the syrian people for seven years. leading to a wave of refugees fleeing this country in the region and when you snooze go through the current with the escalation around syria is destructive to the entire system of international relations with its history will. deliver its verdict and washington already bears a heavy responsibility for the bloody hour rage in yugoslavia iraq and libya. and of quote. from fear of russia has done everything possible to convince the united states and its allies to refrain from their military plans which could lead to a new spiral of violence in syria and destabilize the middle east. the secretary general of the un at the meeting of the security council that we convened yesterday and today and expressed his concern about the way events have developed however in washington london paris preferred to disregard calls to appeal to common sense so

united states and its allies continue to demonstrate a blatant disregard for international law although as permanent members of the security council they must be specially firm in in protecting the provisions of the un charter it was shameful to hear how in justifying the aggression and article of the us constitution was mentioned. now we have the greatest respect to the right each state to respect their own founding law however washington should learn it's time for washington to learn that the international code of behavior regarding the use of force is regulated by the united nations charter. it's interesting how the people of great britain and france look at what they will think that when they find out that their governor. that is taking place taking part in an illegal military adventure and by referring to the american constitution well suited to doing it when you're constantly you constantly tempted

by neo colonialism but anybody who's know when you have nothing but disdain for the un charter and the security council with which you aren't unjustifiably trying to use it for your illicit aims there is no serious work that you're doing in the security council you know you don't consult us and you and mendaciously claim otherwise we undermine the authority of the security council countries to promote them as a pretext for aggression when you mention the alleged use of chemical weapons in the syrian city of duma these people if they were to be representatives of russia. after an inspection by our experts unequivocally stated that no such incident took place one of the furthermore there were people founders with who took part in this the staging of political rally muslims and in fact the inspirers and organizes that staging were foreign intelligence services with little blue shoes this is after this event the busier now thirty immediately invited experts from the organization

for the prohibition of chemical weapons so that they conduct a field mission to do my in order to establish the facts we're going to do you love them you know we want to quickly because he's a formalities were resolved and guarantees of security were provided at the time the strikes were conducted and experts were already in syria and getting ready to begin their work i want to recall them so it is up to the members of the security council and everyone else is that an attempt or a present when i draft resolution would be supposed that i would be on to the secure work of the special mission of the o.p.c. w. was blocked not only want we were assured of that and the fact that such a document was not necessary to receive we were told to pull me that the mission will consider that without any additional efforts by the yearly council will go visit he would be the site and conduct an investigation of the chemical incident now and it is clear that we were absolutely right. you know i knew that the minister yesterday some of our colleagues some of them naive li some of them

cynically but if you told us what so that's the reason of the situations and supposedly a lack of an independent investigative mechanism because all of the aggression has shown that that isn't this is not the issue at all as we stated. you know like in the during last year's attack against the sharon airbase there was the joint investigative mechanism of the un o.p.c. the way that did not prevent the united states from conduct like a missile strike afterwards or the gym and in fact made sure that its conclusions coincided with the reasons for the american strike have said many times you don't need any investigations then you would have thought that you didn't need them then and you don't need them today. the organizers of the aggression didn't even wait till really fucked over the elementary establishment of facts and by an international organization which is authorized to do that because they supposedly determine everything for themselves and determine who is guilty so i mean after all given that when they themselves with the fighters that were under their control and

n.g.o.s that they control they disseminated. rumors using social media with the group you know they confirm this through so-called secret intelligence. mythical smiles mythical six second chances are most ladies and gentlemen the masks are rather white helmets or what have once again fallen. we are already used to the fact that when they conduct their downfall jew political policies the countries that are aggressors already have. blamed the regime of assad lately they tend to shift responsibility to on russia which according to their interpretation cannot control the dictator but i will miss you all this is based on a scheme that is well that has been well tried as a provocation as mendacious. mendacious accusations verdict and

punishment. you know this is how you want international affairs to be conducted now when it comes to this and this is hooliganism in international relations and not minor league in is and given that we're talking about major nuclear powers newsgroup we've got a movement several strikes were conducted against the scientific research center in bars and jam or i am a student in a book or been recently to inspections by the opi c.w. were conducted with the un impeded access to all facilities studies the us experts didn't find any traces of activity that would contravene the can the chemical weapons convention mode. would mutely the scientific of the so it is in syria use only for peaceful activity which is aimed at enhanced singa economic the effectiveness of economic activity of syria and you want syria to have no economy

at all but you just got really difficult you want to withdraw this country back into the stone age and just if you're is a go this country was one of the most developed countries in the middle east. you want to you want to finish off what you're sanctions haven't achieved yet with at the same time a bug you're trying to eat you are shedding crocodile tears about the suffering of ordinary syrians ordinary syrians which who are tired of war and they were having that their legitimate or thirty's have freed their territory or not you're not interested in their self or your aggressive actions contribute to worsening the humanitarian situation which you are so worried about according to your statements we must be moved once that you didn't just toss them over in twenty four hours you could stop the conflict in syria for this washington london and paramount this way only having to give orders to two there are handpicked terrorists to stop their fighting against the legitimate authorities and against their own people would not

have pursued the strikes were conducted against syrian military air fields which are being used in the course of an operator. against terrorist organizations want to give money it's a quite an original contribution to the combat against international terrorism as washington keeps repeating. which as washington keeps repeating is the only goal of its military presence in syria we have serious doubts about that. so you know it seems that it would be to reclaim its viewers clear that those who are in the west who are covering themselves with humanitarian rhetoric are trying to. and trying to justify their action in syria by your supposedly to defeat the jihadists are actually aiming at dividing dismembering the country thank you this is confirmed by the fact that. the united states has refused to take part in rebuilding the areas of syria that have been freed from the jadis. lastly your

aggression is a movie major. and the threat against the possibility of continuing the political process under the un auspices which in spite of the objective difficulties was moving forward at varying speeds if you will go stood it was abuse good and so on what were your constant references to the geneva process is worth if you yourselves using your own actions and your own actions are destroying that process is why we call on the united states and its allies to mediately and being aggressive actions against syria and to refrain from them in the future we'll put it underground we. we're going to move putting forward for your attention to a brief draft resolution which we will demand a vote on at the end of this meeting that you know we would like to address the members of the security council today is not the time to share shirk your responsibilities most of all but the whole world is looking at you. take

a principled stand thank you. thank heaven for sensitive of the russian federation for his statements and i now give the floor to the representative of the united states. thank you mr president and thank you mr secretary general for your briefing today. this is our fifth security council meeting in the past week to address the situation in syria. a week has gone by in which we have talked we've talked about the victims in duma we've talked about the assad regime and its patrons russia and iran we've spent a week talking about the unique horror of chemical weapons the time for talk and did last night where here today because three permanent members of the united nations security council acted the united kingdom france and the united states acted not as revenge not as punishment not as

a symbolic show of force we acted to deter the future use of chemical weapons by holding the syrian regime responsible for its atrocities against humanity we can all see that a russian dissin from asian campaign is in full force this morning but russia's desperate attempts at deflection deflection cannot change the facts. a large body of information indicates that the syrian regime used chemical weapons in duma on april seventh there is clear information demonstrating assad's culpability the pictures of dead children were not fake news they were the result of the syrian regime's barbaric inhumanity and they were the result of the regime and russia's failure to live up to their international commitments to remove all chemical weapons from syria. the united states france and the united kingdom acted after

careful evaluation of these facts the targets we selected were at the heart of the syrian regime's illegal chemical weapons program the strikes were carefully planned to minimize civilian casualties the responses were justified legitimate and proportionate the united states and its allies did everything we could to use the tools of diplomacy to get rid of assad's arsenal of chemical weapons we did not give diplomacy just one chance we gave diplomacy a chance after chance six times that's how many times russia vetoed security council resolutions to address chemical weapons in syria our efforts go back even further in two thousand and thirteen the security council passed a resolution that required the assad regime to destroy its stockpile of chemical weapons syria committed to.